Paratroopers

@TG:

Oh, and please don’t diss improved factories!

Go back and reread my original post:

“Paratroopers is probably the worst tech you can unlock next to Improved Factory production or Rockets for USA.”

I dissed Improved Factories and Rockets for UNITED STATES.  I’ve made it clear in the past of how good Improved Factories can be for Russia or Germany.  You madame, lose.   :wink:

I disagree on all counts.

US Rockets in Algeria and UK can pay for it’s research rather quickly. You could even put one in Egypt for the inevitable Japanese IC in India.

If I got Improved Factories, I would let the US take Algeria and Libya and put two 3-unit factories in each. That would be more than enough to keep the Italians out of Africa and then you could send your entire fleet west to engage the Japanese. With the west coast covered by your fleet and the Atlantic inaccessible to the Axis, you could leave the US devoid of units. And if the Italian fleet is bugging Russia then a 1 turn build of 6 SS supported by a few aircraft would solve that problem.

And with Paratroops, bombers based out of Libya could hit everything from France to Persia including the usually undefended territories like Bulgaria and Balkans. And you wouldn’t even need to sink the Italian fleet.

US AA guns with Radar can hit at 2 in England.

Those things aint nailed to the board ya know.

If I got Improved Factories, I would let the US take Algeria and Libya and put two 3-unit factories in each. That would be more than enough to keep the Italians out of Africa and then you could send your entire fleet west to engage the Japanese. With the west coast covered by your fleet and the Atlantic inaccessible to the Axis, you could leave the US devoid of units. And if the Italian fleet is bugging Russia then a 1 turn build of 6 SS supported by a few aircraft would solve that problem.

Let me get this straight.

You would unlock Improved Factories so you (USA) could take Algeria and Libya, spend 30 IPCs on ICs, wait a turn to place ICs, and hope Italy doesn’t retake both territories before you can place six units?

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(Do you realize what you’re saying?)

Chances are if the Allies can take and hold Algeria and Libya, you’re already winning the African War.  In which case, this just seems like a “win more” move.

Sure you could do something constructive like build transports out of Libya and attempt a landing in Europe, but how do you protect said transports now that you’ve sent your entire navy west to engage the Japanese?

US Rockets in Algeria and UK can pay for it’s research rather quickly. You could even put one in Egypt for the inevitable Japanese IC in India.

Same principle applies.  Though you get +1 Karma for LOLs. 
However, I do realize that you could ship Rockets to England, in which case I take back what I said, American rockets are useful.

And with Paratroops, bombers based out of Libya could hit everything from France to Persia including the usually undefended territories like Bulgaria and Balkans. And you wouldn’t even need to sink the Italian fleet.

So your strategy hinges on getting infantry to Libya, landing bombers in Libya, picking up said infantry and parachuting them into undefended territories, while landing back in Libya so you could do it again?  And during all of this, you’re relaying on your bombers not to get strafed on the ground as they await your paradrop?

No thanks.

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US AA guns with Radar can hit at 2 in England.

Read: “But consider how often UK gets bombed and why the German wouldn’t just start bombing Russia instead.”

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Thanks A44, my point as well.  You can also move them to Karelia, Caucasus and Russia too.

Me = Russia.   
You = United States

“Gee, thanks for sending that Radar guided AA-gun over, Jennifer.  We can finally shoot down those German bombers.  Too bad you had to cancel out my National Objective just to do it.”

Also, Germany getting Radar and/or Improved Factories ends, permanently, the allies SBR campaigns.  Why risk your bomber to score 3 or 4 IPC in damage when you have a 33% chance of getting shot down and the enemy will only pay 1 or 2 IPC to repair?

Now on the flip side, how often does Germany go for Air/Naval Tech to even Radar?  You’re much better off gunning for Improved Factories and hitting something useful like Mechanized infantry along the way.

Radar, still worthless.

I’d say Improved Factories, Mechanized Infantry, Paratroopers are the top three on Chart 1.

For me it’s: War bonds, Mechanized Infantry, Advanced Artillery.  Rockets deserves to be mentioned

I’d say Heavy Bombers, Long Range Aircraft, Improved Shipyards are the top three on Chart 2.

Same.  Jet Fighters is also up there.

The worst on Chart 2, and the absolute worst tech in EVERY incarnation of the game I have ever played, is Super Submarines.
The worst on Chart 1, and still INCREDIBLY good and useful, is War Bonds

Chart 2:  Radar
Chart 1:  Paratroopers

Now Jenn, you know there is that unwritten rule that the Axis can not buy bombers and must buy all tanks instead.

Honestly I can find a good use for all the techs except super subs.

Except if we were handing out techs I would give that to Italy with 1 sub to represent the Italian fast attack craft which were some of the best of their type in the war.

Finding the use for the techs and who to get them by does however require one to discard the baggage of games of A&A past.

You guys keep talking about shipping  AA guns to allied territories, but doesn’t that change the owner ship and cancel the tech?

The last thing I want to say.

If I ever see you two at a board game convention, say Gen Con or Origins, I’d like to have a seat next to you at the Axis and Allies table.  We would play three games, each of us as USA and each of us with a different starting tech.

Game 1: U-505 with Paratroopers or Improved Factories

Game 2: Cmdr Jennifer with Radar

Game 3: Moses with Supersubs

(To keep some semblance of fairness we’ll say USA starts off with 5 less IPCs or something)

I’m interested to see what the results would be.  :wink:

If a bomber carries an infantry to a combat, and the bomber is destroyed by AA fire, what happens to the infantry?

@TG:

Let me get this straight.

You would unlock Improved Factories so you (USA) could take Algeria and Libya, spend 30 IPCs on ICs, wait a turn to place ICs, and hope Italy doesn’t retake both territories before you can place six units?

…

…

…

(Do you realize what you’re saying?)

Yes, I realize exactly what I am saying.

I would take Algeria and Libya with 1 infantry and then not transport any more units to Africa in hopes that I could build 2 undefended factories right under the nose of Italy because it is so sneaky that it just might work.

And if I developed rockets, and I had the capacity to transport AA to Algeria I wouldn’t send any other units with them because 1 AA immediately makes north Africa completely secure.

And if I developed paratroops, I would leave Libya devoid of anything but my bombers to be strafed by the Axis because, when you have that tech, you don’t have to actually supply the bomber with defensive infantry to paradrop(they are automatically generated).

I was tempted to not even bother responding to this, but I have been bombarded recently by questions regarding whether I was capable of reading the rules or if I have even played the game suggesting that my strategies are outageously foolish and can be proven as such if I would actually bother to learn how to play the game against someone else.

So when you write paragraphs suggesting that I am too stupid to properly defend IC’s or bombers, then I think you deserve a little return sarcasm.

Chances are if the Allies can take and hold Algeria and Libya, you’re already winning the African War.  In which case, this just seems like a “win more” move.

Sure you could do something constructive like build transports out of Libya and attempt a landing in Europe, but how do you protect said transports now that you’ve sent your entire navy west to engage the Japanese?

Same principle applies.  Though you get +1 Karma for LOLs. 
However, I do realize that you could ship Rockets to England, in which case I take back what I said, American rockets are useful.

So your strategy hinges on getting infantry to Libya, landing bombers in Libya, picking up said infantry and parachuting them into undefended territories, while landing back in Libya so you could do it again?  And during all of this, you’re relaying on your bombers not to get strafed on the ground as they await your paradrop?

No thanks.

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Let’s start with Rockets. Assuming I’m smart enough to properly defend Algeria and UK and that it took me roughly 3 researchers to develop it, it would take me 3 turns, on average, to recoup my costs (21$ of damage for 3 turns of attacks. $15 for 3 researchers plus $6 for a new AA=$21). After that it makes money. Less research money and it would only average 2 turns.

Paratroops and Improved IC’s partially serve the same fuction but in different ways. If the US wants to transport troops through the Med and into Europe they have to maintain 2 fully functional fleets (one to protect the TP’s in sz12 and one to deal with the Italian fleet and protect the Med transports). Paratroops and Improved IC’s eliminate the need for one or both of those fleets and in each case there is a possibility that you can ignore the Italian fleet altogether.

With Paratroops, you can eliminate the need for a Med fleet because of bombers based in Libya and excess units transported to Africa make it difficult for Italy to get their NO’s. Just as the Italian fleet serves as support for Germany in the way of clearing Ukraine for Germany to move into and immediately land fighters for defense, US paratroops prevent this. And if Germany doesn’t retake Ukraine to eliminate one of Russia’s NO’s, it also makes it hard for Germany to gain one of their NO’s because Ukraine is usually a key territory for them. With Italy making only 9 IPC’s per turn they would have a hard time doing anything but trading Balkans every turn. Sure, an AA prevents this, but it gets costly to protect every possible territory from paratroop landings. For $48 worth of bombers, you would barely get 2 TP and a loaded CV for that price so it’s easily cheaper than putting a navy in the Med and you wouldn’t have to clear out the Italian navy to do it.

Improved IC’s in Algeria and Libya give you 2 options.

1. Eliminates the need for the sz12 fleet. You can clear the Med and maintain only the Med fleet. With the remaining money after building at the IC’s, you could build aircraft in the US for support or build navy in sz56 to harass the Japanese.

or 2) You could just send your entire navy toward Japan and use the IC’s to prevent Italy from gaining their NO’s and have those ground units move toward Persia to close off the Japanese access to Russia via India. One fighter or a couple extra infantry in Algeria would be enough to protect it from Italian landings so you could effectively ignore the Italian fleet. And if the Italians get bold and build more TP’s, A mass SS and/or aircraft build would eliminate that threat once and for all.

For one tech, you can maintain a fleet of bombers for less than it would cost to have half as many TP’s and their protecting fleet in the Med, and for the the other, $30 completely eliminates the supply chain from the US to North Africa. I just don’t understand how either of those 2 scenarios isn’t cost effective.

For me it’s: War bonds, Mechanized Infantry, Advanced Artillery.  Rockets deserves to be mentioned

I don’t understand how you could put War Bonds ahead of Rockets when 2 Rockets(easy to achieve for any country) average twice as much damage to your enemies as War Bonds can earn you every turn. You can’t get War Bonds twice but you can certainly get multiple Rockets. The only way for War bonds to be better than Rockets is if you reinvested that War Bond money into techs and rolled Rockets.

I believe that you should put the techs in order of usefulness.

1. Mechanized infantry is useful to every country and challenges Heavy Bombers and LRA for the most powerful tech in the game.

2)Rockets is likewise useful to every country and in multiple numbers can be very effective.

3. Increased Factory Production, War Bonds, and Paratroops are tied for third. You can’t put one over the other because while War Bonds is equally useful to every country, IFP and Paratroops are more useful than War Bonds to some countries while being less useful than War Bonds to others.

Improved Arty isn’t that great. Out of 30 units, [20 inf, 10 Improved art] is equal to [15 inf, 15 art]. While I like artillery, spending $100 to save $5 would take most countries 3 turns and you just can’t be that inflexible with your purchases and be effective in every game.

@runyan99:

If a bomber carries an infantry to a combat, and the bomber is destroyed by AA fire, what happens to the infantry?

It is destroyed.

@Cmdr:

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Thanks A44, my point as well.  You can also move them to Karelia, Caucasus and Russia too.

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If Russia is being nailed for 20 IPC a round, I think losing 5 from the NO is worth having the American radar gun.  Just me though.

You know, it’s quite humorous that you argued against these very points that I made in the Axis SBR thread. I’m not going to search for your exact quote, but something along the lines of, the US could NEVER get aa guns to russia in time if you were the Axis player.  :roll:

@Cmdr:

Axis, there is a difference between Revised and Anniversary.  You cannot pull arguments made in one game and try to use them against that person in a completely different game.

My bad, i forgot that the ability of the US to get equipment to Russia is completely different in this game then it is in Revised. Thank You for pointing out my error.